DIGITAL STRATEGY BLOG

The holiday season is finally upon us. After the 853 months so far in 2020 (or maybe it just feels like that many), we're finally in the last month of the weirdest year on record. The good news is, it's also the happiest month of the year! 

I don't know about you, but I look forward to December every year. It's all the lights, gift giving, food, family, friends, and general cheer that surrounds this month that gets me excited. For a lot of businesses though, the thing that really makes them excited about this time of the year is sales. And with 2020 shutting down so much of our in-person activities (like shopping), we are sure to see a gigantic uptick in online shopping this holiday season.  In fact, online sales are expected to spike 25% - 35% this holiday season and reach up to nearly $200 billion! That's why it's time to add a holiday HubSpot chatbot to make your user experience exceptional.

Technology has changed the way that consumers engage with companies. Consumers are doing their own research, interacting with brands personally via social media, and making decisions about your products and services without ever speaking with a salesperson. Which means that your website needs to be working as hard as your salespeople with the help of targeted technology like chatbots.

The end of the year can be viewed as a hectic time to cram in last-minute responsibilities and check off boxes on your to-do list, but it can also present the perfect time to pause and reflect on the past twelve months of ups, downs, and constant learning. 

Here at HIVE, we’ve been winding down 2019 by looking back on the marketing trends that brought us tons of success and others that were more of a whomp-whomp feeling. We enlisted the help of some other digital marketing specialists to create a list of which marketing trends are worth bringing into 2020 and which ones should be left in the dust. 

As the world continues to evolve, so does the way that we use technology and websites. Consumers are less reliant on sales people than they've ever been and that's only going to become more and more true in the coming months and years. Consumers are doing their own research. They're making decisions before talking to your business. They're judging your solutions, products, services, etc. before you have the chance to sell them.

In fact, by 2020 it is estimated that 85% of consumers will engage with businesses without ever interacting with another human being [Gartner].

So how do you go about growing your business, increasing sales, and engaging your prospects if they don't actually talk to you?

Enter chatbots.